


Firsts

by PR Zed (przed)



Category: The Professionals
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-10-16
Updated: 2010-10-16
Packaged: 2017-10-12 17:46:21
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 17,754
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/127425
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/przed/pseuds/PR%20Zed
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>There's a first time for everything.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Firsts

**Author's Note:**

> Previously published in Never Far Apart 2.

The first time Bodie kissed another boy was aboard the second ship he served on, the Balmoral, a small cargo vessel hauling coal from Newcastle down the African coast.

Bodie was sixteen and the steward's assistant, which meant he served food at mealtimes, did whatever needed doing in the kitchen in between, and dreamed of making able seaman so he could escape the constant smell of boiled cabbage below decks. Davy was nineteen and an oiler in the engine room, in charge of whatever scut work the engineers couldn't be bothered with. He was also gorgeous and smug with it. He wore his oil-covered jeans tight and his shirts with the sleeves rolled up as high as they'd go, the better to show off biceps and forearms taut with muscle.

Bodie hadn't quite figured out he might like boys as much as the girls he chatted up on shore leave, but he knew he was drawn to Davy. Sought him out on the upper decks when he knew the engine room blokes were on break. Made sure Davy got the choicest cut of meat when Cook splurged on a nice roast of beef.

Davy noticed him, too. Would give him a smile when they passed each other in the corridor. Would share a fag with him. Would put a friendly arm around him when they were out on the town in Newcastle before the next run, and having a pint with the rest of the lads. It all made Bodie light up in his middle in a way that he was only beginning to understand.

And then Davy kissed him.

They were on deck together, both of them off shift, a warm night breeze off the African coast nearly sweeping the smell of diesel out of their nostrils, the phosphorescent glow of their wake lighting up the ocean behind them. The rest of the crew had gone below decks long ago. They were unloading their cargo in the morning and everyone wanted their sleep before what promised to be a long day. But Davy was restless, and Bodie decided to keep him company.

They were standing at the railing, looking at the sea and the stars and a few moonlit clouds scudding across the sky, their shoulders just touching and an atmosphere of pleasant anticipation building up around them. Then Davy had turned to him, a smile quirking one corner of his mouth, mischief showing in the grey sparkle of his eyes.

"Don't you look like the cat who got the canary," Bodie said. Or rather started to say, because suddenly Davy's mouth was on his and he felt the breath catch in his throat even as he parted his lips with an unexpected eagerness. If Davy was the cat, then Bodie reckoned he was the canary, feathers ruffled, but far from unhappy about it.

The kiss was undemanding, curious, and tasted of coffee and cigarettes and the boiled sweets Davy liked so much. It set off explosions deep within Bodie's head, in his gut, made him rethink everything he thought he knew about poofters and queers and shirtlifters. Because, Christ, this was good and right and what he knew he'd been missing.

Finally, Davy pulled back, leaving Bodie panting and gripping at both the hard wood of the railing and the rough fabric of Davy's shirt for support.

"Like that?"

"Yeah," was all Bodie could say, even though he wanted to say much more, so very much more. But he didn't have the words.

"Thought you might." And there was that smug smile of Davy's. "Want to do it again?"

"Yeah," Bodie said, his voice more sure this time. "Definitely." And he smiled himself, trying to match Davy for smugness and hoping he didn't look as naff and young as he felt.

"Thought you might," Davy said again.

oOo

The first time Doyle kissed another boy he was a wiry thirteen, on heat for anything that moved. He'd kissed his first girl two years before. Jenny Malloy, prettiest girl in the school, so of course he'd wanted her. And as it turned out, she'd wanted him right back. Told him he was a good kisser and all.

But at thirteen, he wasn't thinking of Jenny anymore. His thoughts were all for Matthew McCutcheon.

Matthew was a striker on the school football team and always ready for a scrap. The girls giggled after him, the boys idolized him. Doyle just wanted to kiss him, in the worst way possible. Could feel his skin tingle when Matthew walked by, felt his mouth go dry when Matthew spared him a smile or a brief hello. Couldn't think of anything else but the wanting.

He didn't think anything would ever come of it though. Cocky he might be, but even Doyle knew his limits. At least he did then.

But then one evening after a football match, he found himself alone in the school changing room with Matthew. Doyle was the scrawniest boy on the side and hadn't touched the ball more than twice in the game. Matthew had scored the winning goal and was the hero of the hour. But Matthew smiled at him, told him he'd done well and Doyle felt like he'd won the pools and the FA cup all in one.

He grinned, and started to pull his jumper over his head, only to find his arms held in place by a firm grip, his vision obscured by his jumper.

"Let go," he said, panic that Matthew had sussed out the way he felt, that he was about to take a beating flaring inside him.

"No." Matthew's voice was as firm as his grip and held just a trace of smugness.

"What do you want?" Doyle asked, struggling with Matthew and his jumper and getting nowhere with either one.

In answer, Matthew released his arms, pulled the jumper off and pinned Doyle against his locker. "Same thing you do."

Doyle thrashed about, wondering how much he'd given away, and what Matthew was going to do to him if he'd discovered his secret. "Don't know what you mean."

"Think you do." Matthew drew closer until Doyle could feel his breath on the skin of his cheek. And then Matthew did it, leaned in all the way and kissed Doyle. Doyle bucked against him, and their teeth clashed together and their hands caught at each other and then, before he knew it, he was kissing Matthew back, feeling him, smelling him, tasting him.   
He'd only started to believe this was real, that it was happening, when Matthew pulled away. Doyle braced himself for the joke or the punch or the kick. Instead, Matthew looked at him with a grin. "Anyone ever told you you're a good kisser?" he asked.

"Yeah," Doyle said, smiling in relief and eagerness and pride. "A few."

"They were right." Matthew kissed him again, and Doyle thought that this was even better than kissing a girl. It made him feel breathless and flushed and it made him want. The sort of want you spent a lifetime trying to satisfy.

oOo

The first time Bodie saw Raymond Doyle was at CI5's training facility. Cowley had sent him to look over the latest intake of agents, give them a once over, see if they were all wheat or if there was any chaff they should be shut of. Which was how he came to be watching the lot of them from the observation area when Jack Craine paired them off for hand-to-hand sparring.

Amongst a field of mostly military men, Doyle stood out like a scruffy urchin. Hair too long and running riot with curls, clothes that looked like they came from an Oxfam shop and an attitude that ran to a feline arrogance.

Bodie reckoned the other recruits would make a meal of him.

They didn't. And not for lack of trying. After he took out his first two opponents, burly military types who clearly didn't like to lose, and certainly not to such a scruffy oik, the rest of them circled Doyle for the kill. But Doyle's scrawny frame had a wiry strength that Bodie wouldn't have credited. And the little bastard was only too willing to do what was needed to take down his opponents. In the end there was only one of the group who came even close to besting Doyle, and Doyle took him out with a very dirty move that Bodie only just saw coming and couldn't help but admire.

There was a beauty in the movement of a very good fighter; Bodie could see that beauty in Doyle. He showed no hesitation between thought and action, had a street fighter's instincts for the kill. Very useful man to have in your corner, Bodie thought.

Very difficult, too. There was the arrogance, for a start. Would get up the nose of some of the lads. And then there was his size. He might have the height, just, but the skinny git would attract the notice of every hard man who might think he was an easy target.

He shared his impressions of the man with Cowley that evening. That Doyle was the one to watch in the intake. That he was an arrogant sod and would need a certain kind of partner. A partner who wouldn't be fighting with the IRA over who got to put a bullet into him first.

He did not share his opinion that Doyle was also the sexiest bastard he'd come across in years. Possibly ever. Didn't tell the Cow, as if he ever would, how the way he squared off for a fight made Bodie's breath quicken. How the way he propped himself against a wall while waiting for his turn, one hip thrust out, a wry, knowing smile twisting a mouth designed for more carnal things, made Bodie's prick hard. Made him think about Davy, all those years ago. Made him think about taking the risk of being with another man for the first time since…well, for a long time.

None of that was for sharing. Not with Cowley. Not with his mates. And not with Doyle. Not ever with Doyle.

But being partners with the man, that might be the ticket. Because instinctively Bodie knew they could work together. Knew they'd be good together. The best.

And that opinion was one he definitely did share with the Cow.

oOo

The first time Doyle saw William Andrew Philip Fucking Bodie was in George Cowley's office.

He'd just come off the CI5 training course, and if he said so himself, he hadn't done too badly. Top in marksmanship with a handgun, and well he should have been. Top in hand to hand as well, and that had surprised him a bit. But most of the blokes he'd been up against were military. No imagination, the lot of them. A little ingenuity and they'd been at his mercy.

Courses done, results tallied and totalled, they had all been summoned back to the hallowed, dingy halls of CI5 headquarters to await their fate. Cowley kept them waiting in the corridor, sitting on uncomfortable folding chairs or slouching against the walls, as his secretary called them in one by one to get their first assignments. And to meet their partners.

Doyle stood apart from the rest, as he'd done throughout the training sessions. Not that he'd had much choice in the matter. The military lot had clearly been upset at being bested by a member of the Met and had worked hard at making his life a misery. The few other coppers in the group had steered clear of him, though he still wasn't sure if that was because they didn't want the army blokes targeting them as well, or if the tales of him turning in bent coppers had followed him to CI5.

Lone wolf, he'd heard more than one of them call him. And he didn't mind that a bit if it meant he didn't have to work with any of them.

He was the last one called into Cowley's office, everyone else paired off like the animals on Noah's bloody ark. Then it was his turn.

Cowley was behind his desk, looking as severe as ever. And in the corner of the room, behind the chair Cowley waved him over to, was Bodie.

Not that he knew his name at the time. All he could see was a handsome bastard in a suit and tie, his hair cut military short, a galling smirk on his face, and too full of himself by far. The memory of all the slights and bruises that those bastard soldiers had visited upon him in training rose up inside him, leaving Doyle hungering for a chance to wipe that smirk off this bastard soldier's face.

Then Cowley had introduced them, told him he was to be partnered with Bodie--"Just Bodie," the smarmy bastard insisted--and that their performance would be judged. That he was on probation, pending a three month review. That Bodie would be involved in evaluating his performance.

Would he, now? Fuck.

Not that Doyle said anything untoward. He nodded when he had to and agreed to it all. Because after all, this was what he wanted. CI5. With or without Just Bodie--Doyle briefly wondered what would happen if he started calling him Billy--he wanted this. Needed it. Knew he was suited to it like nothing else. All he had to do was survive his three month review and then maybe Cowley would see how ill suited their partnership was and reassign them.

They left the office with orders to get to know each other and report in at 0800 the next day for their first assignment. Minor stuff to start with, he'd been warned. A warm up for the real thing. Doyle hoped they'd be given a chance at the real thing sooner rather than later.

As Cowley's door closed behind them, he wondered how the fuck they were supposed to do it. Get to know each other when all he wanted was to get away from the man. He'd got a few steps ahead of his partner when he felt a hand on his shoulder.

"Nearly lunch," Bodie said. "There's a pub around the corner. Beer's not bad and they do a sandwich if you ask nicely."

"And do you?" Doyle said, more nastily than he intended. "Ask nicely?"

"Always," Bodie replied, and there was that bloody smirk again. Doyle started to seriously wonder if even a fist to his face would banish that expression. Only the sure knowledge that Cowley would have him back in the Met nice and sharp if he let loose his temper, and that the Met wanted him as much as he wanted it, stayed his hand.

"All right, then." Doyle gestured forward. "Lead the way."

Bodie did, taking him around the block and through the door of what Doyle had to admit was not a bad pub, even if it was lousy with CI5 agents. All the new intake seemed to be there getting to know their partners, along with a few senior agents Doyle recognized from training exercises.

Turned out the beer was quite good and the sandwiches acceptable. Bodie still irked him no end, though. Something about him, beyond the suit and the obvious military manner and his smug arrogance, made the back of Doyle's neck prickle. Something that he knew he didn't want to investigate too closely, lest it bring back things he hadn't thought of in years.

He'd tuned Bodie out as his erstwhile partner droned on about an op and a bird and how he'd had his leg over. He was concentrating on shredding his napkin when Bodie grabbed his wrist.

He looked up, shocked at the sudden contact.

"Don't like me much. Do you, Doyle?" The smugness was gone from Bodie's face and in its place was a coolly evaluating stare that hinted at an unexpected intelligence.

"Don't know you," Doyle said taking back his hand.

"No, you don't. But you don't like me either." Bodie kept his eyes directed steadily at Doyle.

"No," Doyle said, suddenly sure that returning honesty for honesty would see him through this.

"Why?" Bodie showed no offence, only curiosity.

"Well…" Doyle hesitated for a moment before continuing. "Haven't got much use for army blokes." He nodded at the cluster of newly minted agents at the bar. "Your lot kept trying to knock me teeth in during training."

"Bet they weren't the first." Bodie had the cheek to smile at him.

"How do you know that?"

"Never mind," Bodie said quickly. "That can't be the only reason you don't like the army."

"Well, they didn't show too much imagination during training. Go too much by the rules. Can't think beyond 'em."

Bodie smiled again, and this time the expression showed genuine amusement rather than conceit. "You might say the same thing about plods. Can't handle anything that's not in the Met handbook."

"'Ang on," Doyle said, getting indignant.

"I said you might say that." Bloody bastard was still smiling. "I didn't say I would." He stopped and paused. "Well, not about you, anyway."

"Big of you." Doyle knew there was still a hint of irritation in his voice, but he couldn't be too offended. After all, there was a reason he wanted out of the Met.

"Isn't it?" The smugness was back, and with it Doyle's desire to pull back his fist and pound the living shite out of Bodie.

"Bastard," Doyle said, pulling back his lips from his teeth more in a snarl than a smile. He went to stand up, wondering what Cowley would do if he went to him now, told him there was no way he could work with this snide git.

But Bodie's hand was on his wrist again, pulling him back into his seat.

"Sit down," Bodie said, and this time there was no amusement, no arrogance in his expression. Only deadly seriousness.

"Why should I?" Doyle said, but he did take his seat.

"Would it help if I told you I asked Cowley to partner us?"

"What?" And that was the one thing Doyle hadn't expected to hear. That Bodie wanted him as his partner, hadn't just been saddled with the poor plod. Unless this was just another piss take. "Why?" he asked, narrowing his eyes.

"Cowley asked me to evaluate your lot."

"Didn't see you there."

"You weren't meant to. I could tell from the start that you were the best. Thought we could work well together." He smiled again, and the smugness was almost back. "I also thought you'd annoy the fuck out of most of the other lads."

"Did you, now." Doyle let loose his best predator's smile. "I imagine that'd be more your line."

Bodie could have taken offence at that. Could have acted as pissed off as Doyle had been from the start. But he didn't. He just smiled, a real smile not the smarmy excuse for one he'd been wearing, and winked and said "Who's been telling tales then?"

Doyle couldn't help it. He laughed. Because maybe the bastard had a real sense of humour. And maybe this would work out after all.

oOo

The first time Bodie hurt someone very badly indeed, he was an able seaman on the Stonegate.

The Stonegate was the third ship he'd served on. He'd been lucky with his first two ships. On the Balmoral, and the Pride of Liverpool before her, the crews had been friendly and willing to show a young kid the ropes. The crew on the Pride of Liverpool had taught him how to defend himself, probably knowing he was far younger than he'd let on and knowing he'd need that skill sooner or later. On the Balmoral, where he'd finally made able seaman, Davy and the lads had shown him some of the nastier bits of street fighting. And Bodie had been bloody good at it all. Once he learned the moves, he could take any one of the men who'd taught him. Even Davy.

He should've stayed on the Balmoral. Stayed with a crew he knew, and a friend who was more than a friend. But then he'd run into the Stonegate's master in Newcastle, offering twice the pay of the Balmoral and promising more adventure besides, and he couldn't resist. Not even when he'd had his doubts about the crew members he met. Not even when Davy had begged him to stay. He'd been feeling the need for change, to see more than Newcastle and a few shabby African ports, so he had joined the crew of the Stonegate.

It only took him a day to realize he'd made a mistake.

The Stonegate's crew weren't just a rough lot, they were a bunch of right bastards. By the time he bunked down for his first night onboard, Bodie hated the lot of them. But he still thought he could manage it. Keep his head down, work out his contract. Maybe hook up with the Balmoral again. With Davy.

Then at the end of the first week he met Derry McIntyre, and he realized just what serious trouble he was in.

McIntyre was the mad bastard all the other mad bastards avoided. Rumour was he'd killed a man on his last ship. Had got away with it, too, everyone else being too afraid of what he might do to grass on him. Bodie had heard the gossip and dismissed it as hot air. Until he ran into McIntyre. Literally.

He'd been working a double shift, taking up the slack for senior seamen who couldn't be arsed to do their job. As the new bloke aboard, Bodie knew he had to do it all or take the blame. By the time he was walking back through the corridors, he was asleep on his feet, which was the only explanation for why he stumbled when the ship gave an unexpected lurch, right into the man coming down the corridor towards him. Even in heavy seas he was normally rock steady on his feet.

When he looked up to see who he'd banged into, he knew it had to be McIntyre.

A big man was McIntyre, imposing in both height and breadth. His size might have been mistaken for fat, but running into the man, Bodie felt the muscle underneath.

"Watch where you're going, you stupid gobshite," McIntyre yelled at Bodie and pushed him into the wall. The man hadn't put any energy behind the push, but Bodie knew he'd be sporting a bruise on his shoulder for a week.

"Sorry," Bodie mumbled. He turned his eyes firmly to the floor. Not his usual bearing, but he'd learned the hard way how best to survive on this ship.

"Not sorry enough," McIntyre said, knocking him against the bulkhead before putting a finger firmly on Bodie's chest. "I've marked your card, my son. Mind you watch it."

Bodie inwardly groaned as he watched McIntyre walk away. He knew he was for it now. And McIntyre didn't disappoint. He made it his personal mission to torment Bodie. He'd give Bodie a push when he saw him on deck. Or trip him when he was carrying his tray in the mess. And Bodie lost track of how many times McIntyre mocked him in front of the other men, and had them joining in. After a month, Bodie wasn't sure he'd be able to make it to the end of his contract.

Then they landed at Dakar.

Bodie was seriously considering jumping ship by then, though it wouldn't be easy. The ship's master kept a sharp eye on all the crew when they were docked, especially new men. Would probably lose half the ship's company if he didn't. Still, Bodie reckoned it might be worth the risk.

He was on deck the first night in port, looking over the railing at the scattered lights of Dakar, when McIntyre found him.

McIntyre had already been ashore and was in as foul a mood as Bodie had ever seen. He'd been drinking, too. Bodie could smell the alcohol on him, could see that his gait was unsteady, his gaze unfocussed. Could see the nasty smile he gave when he registered Bodie's presence.

"Well, if it isn't the stupid gobshite." Even drunk, McIntyre moved fast for a big man, and before Bodie could react he was pinned between McIntyre's bulk and a life raft. "Enjoying your evening, gobshite?"

Knowing there was no answer that wasn't going to set McIntyre off, Bodie kept his mouth shut and his eyes down.

"Cat got your tongue, gobshite?" McIntyre poked him in the shoulder. Hard. "Or just too stuck up to talk to the likes of me?" With that, McIntyre took a swing at him. He only landed a glancing blow but even that was enough to rock Bodie's head back and turn his world grey at the edges. He was blinking, trying to recover when he saw McIntyre smile. Later, much later, he would recognize it as the sort of smile a jackal gave to prey it was about to rip apart. Bodie had just enough time to take a deep breath and raise his own fists before McIntyre laid into him.

McIntyre might have been big and vicious, but Bodie soon realized he was as drunk as he was undisciplined. And Bodie was neither. His mates on the Pride of Liverpool and the Balmoral had taught him to fight. And experience--his gran's death, his da's petty cruelties--had taught him that letting emotion overwhelm him, be it fear or anger or grief, was no way to live. So he tucked in his elbows like Big Bob had shown him, planted his feet like Davy had done, and fought for his life.

He blocked the punches he could, absorbed the ones he couldn't and landed as many blows as he could manage. He knew there was pain in his hand as he punched McIntyre in the jaw, bone impacting on bone, but he ignored it, just as he ignored the blow McIntyre delivered to his ribs. He went for the targets he knew would deliver the most damage: throat, solar plexus, kidneys. He brought his heel down hard on McIntyre's knee and was satisfied when he staggered. There was blood on his hands, on his face, on the deck, but he didn't know if it was his or McIntyre's and he didn't bloody care.

Then, finally, McIntyre stumbled. Another blow and he stumbled again. Bodie took a deep breath and launched one final attack. He could feel the skin on his knuckles split as he hit McIntyre on the nose, could hear the air leave McIntyre's lungs as he struck him in the gut. And then the big man fell, struck the metal of the deck like an ox under the butcher's hammer. A few last twitches and he was out.

Part of Bodie wanted to go on punching, to kick the bastard until he was bleeding, until he was dead, but he didn't. He stood there for a moment, frozen by what he'd done and trying to decide what to do next.

No question, he had to run. He didn't fancy Dakar justice if McIntyre died. And he didn't fancy ship's justice if he lived. On board, Bodie reckoned he wouldn't live till teatime tomorrow.

He dragged McIntyre behind a life raft, out of easy sight, and made his way back to his cabin. He threw everything that was important to him, and it wasn't much, into a duffle, slipped on his jacket and was over the side of the ship and on shore before McIntyre could be found or an alarm raised.

By dawn he was on the streets of Dakar, relief at being off the Stonegate mixing with worry about how he was going to survive. Not that he let any emotion show. He just hefted his duffle onto his shoulder, strode down the street and got on with the business of living.

oOo

The first time Doyle hurt someone, really hurt them and not just gave them a bit of a kicking, he was in a Derby park. Sixteen years old he was, and a right terror in jeans and black leather, a switchblade hidden in his boot and a sneer constantly on his lips.

He was a far cry from the sinewy kid who'd spent a summer snogging his mate on the football team, and he knew it. He'd heard the old biddies on the street as he passed. _That's the Doyle boy. Did you hear? His da died last year. Hasn't been the same since. On his way to Borstal, the way he's going._

Doyle didn't give a flying fuck what they said. He was just angry. At everyone. Angry at his da for dying. Angry at his mum for having to work as a charwoman. Angry at his sisters for escaping their glum house for glum marriages. He wanted to scream and yell and pull the walls down around him. But he couldn't.

But then that stupid prat called him a wanker in front of the whole school and suddenly he had a focus for his anger. Someone he could take it out on. So he tracked down the bastard, found him in the park and had a go at him with his fists. And his knife.

What scared him afterwards was how easy it was, sliding the blade beneath the kid's defences and into his side. What scared him even more was how much he enjoyed it, letting his vision go red, letting the fury ride him.

He threw the knife into the Derwent the next day, watched until it drifted beneath the surface of the scummy water and out of sight.

Two days later, the kid's mates found him, cornered him in an alley that stank of rubbish and cat piss. They kicked him till he bruised, till he bled, till bones broke, till he coughed blood. He didn't beg, didn't yell, didn't scream, just clenched his jaw and took it. Even when they smashed his face in. Because he knew he deserved it, deserved everything he got, the dead da, the kicking, the lot.

oOo

The first time Bodie found out what a hot-tempered bastard Ray Doyle really was, they were in a stinking alley in Brixton. They'd been chasing down grasses all day, looking for a bloke who knew a bloke who might know something about an arms shipment coming in the next day. An arms shipment that Cowley very badly wanted found and stopped.

And they'd been getting nowhere.

Everyone they talked to either ran, clammed up, or gave them aggro and little bloody else. By the time they ran down Big Sammy Watson both of them were knackered and pissed off. Bodie hadn't realized just how pissed off Doyle was, though. Not until they chased Big Sammy down into a dead end alley, threading their way through packing crates and avoiding slipping on rotting veg. Not until the stupid big bastard realized he was trapped and unwisely picked Doyle to turn on.

Bodie had to hand it to Sammy: he did manage to land one good punch, right in Doyle's gut. Unfortunately for Sammy, the only thing the punch accomplished was to piss Doyle off even more. Before Bodie's eyes, Doyle transformed from determined agent into frenzied berserker. If Sammy had possessed the sense of a bag of crisps, he'd have surrendered then and there, but the silly git never would back down from a fight. He came out swinging and before he knew what had hit him, Doyle had waded in and knocked him into a thousand puzzle pieces.

And Doyle didn't stop there. With Sammy on the ground, bruised, bleeding and throwing up his hands in self defence, Doyle kept landing punch after punch, not letting up, the look on his face not entirely sane.

It took Bodie a bit to realize he needed to pull Doyle off, to hold him until he stopped trying to get back at Sammy, until he cooled down. When it came right down to it, he hadn't expected Doyle to do that: lose his cool and turn into an uncontrolled force of nature.

Even in the short time they'd been partnered, five months now, Doyle was the one he counted on to be the voice of reason. The one who questioned what they did. The one who had a fully functioning conscience. Bodie had long since realized that he'd lost his conscience years ago, had surrendered it to whatever commanding officer he was working for, trusting to the troop, or the Regiment, or Cowley to keep him on the side of the angels.

But holding a writhing, raging Ray Doyle in his arms made him more human to Bodie. Made him less the sanctimonious bastard he seemed so fond of playing, if only to get up Bodie's nose.

That made Bodie like him even more. He'd always taken a perverse pleasure in discovering his paragons had feet of clay. It was comforting that Doyle's feet had turned out to be positively mucky.

oOo

The first time Doyle found out what a cold-blooded bastard Bodie was, they were stuck in the middle of a bar fight in Limehouse, surrounded by a bunch of Northern Irish workmen who'd objected to the CI5 agents trying to pull one of their lads back to headquarters for questioning on suspicion of running with the IRA.

Whole bloody lot of them probably ran with the IRA, Doyle thought as the crowd made a run at them. Or wanted to. And then there was no time for thinking anything at all beyond where to kick, where the next punch would land, which arm to raise to block a blow.

They were outnumbered. Badly. But they were also trained, and the rabble they were facing had fought only in bar punch-ups like this one. Doyle fought them as they came at him, used what Brian Macklin and the Met and Derby's streets had taught him. And all the while he struggled to keep hold of his temper, knowing letting it off the leash would only earn his a bollocking from Cowley, even as he was aware just how thin that leash was, and how good it would feel to let it go.

When he'd managed to lay out three of the toe-rags and had another three on the run, he took a breath and looked up to where Bodie was finishing up across the pub.

A marvel to watch, was Bodie. Used the minimum amount of force required to put down his opponent, no more, no less, and then moved on to the next one. And his face…Doyle thought his face was beautiful. His mouth was set in a line of concentration, his brow drawn into a slight frown, but that was it. Determined, but not angry. Not raging.

Doyle couldn't help but admire him for it. No loss of control for Bodie. No fighting constantly to keep his temper in check.

As Doyle watched, Bodie put down the last of his opponents with a measured punch to the head and then straightened up, dusted himself off and shot Doyle one of his patented Bodie grins. Doyle couldn't help but grin back. Because, God help him, even in this fuckin' poor excuse for a pub, even in the midst of moaning Irish bastards and a pissed off bartender, even here Bodie could put him in a good mood. More than that, actually. Bodie could make him feel like the sun had come out and the birds were singing and the Cow himself was serving up Flake 99s.

Didn't bear thinking on, that.

So Doyle didn't. Just clapped Bodie on the back, gave the last of the Irish lads standing a bit of a shove to topple him and got their suspect back to HQ.

oOo

The first time Bodie had sex with a man was in the back room of a club in Dakar. Bodie had been hired as a bouncer at the club, the Roi du Soleil, his first day in Dakar, his bruised and split knuckles serving as resume and reference.

He'd wondered why such a posh club had hired a scruff like him. After a week Henri, the head bouncer, enlightened him. Told him it was a mark of status for the club, having a young, tough and beautiful Englishman working the door. Bodie blushed at that. He knew he was handsome--girls had been telling him that since his early school days--but he'd never been called beautiful before.

Jean-Marc was the bartender, and Bodie had noticed him right away. He had piercing green eyes, a haughty mouth and skin the colour of the café au lait Bodie drank with breakfast. According to Henri, Jean-Marc's mother was African, his father was French and he spoke perfect French, English, Wolof and four other African languages. He was also, according to Henri, an aloof, unapproachable bastard.

Bodie didn't care. He spent his breaks sitting at the back of the club and watching Jean-Marc as he chatted with the customers and poured their drinks, his movements controlled and graceful. Bodie wondered what it would be like to be the recipient of one of the bartender's rare smiles.

The job wasn't taxing, but Bodie enjoyed it. His presence was generally enough to stop any trouble, and the few times he'd had to help Henri throw an unruly drunk out of the club it had been a doddle. And he had to admit he liked the attention he got. There always seemed to be women, brown, white and black, willing to share their beds and their bodies.

And there was Jean-Marc.

Bodie hovered at the outer edges of Jean-Marc's orbit, a bit of stray planetary debris that didn't even register on the bartender's radar. And Bodie desperately wanted to register. He was drawn to Jean-Marc like he'd been drawn to no other person, male or female. What he'd done with Davy--a bit of snogging, a bit of wanking, the occasional blowjob--was nothing compared to what he wanted to do with Jean-Marc, dark, forbidden acts that made him hard just to think of them. Fantasies that seemed destined to remain forever unrealized.

Then one afternoon before opening he was in the storeroom, hefting some boxes, when he heard the door open softly behind him.

"Be done in a tick, Henri," he said, assuming it was the big man, come to load him up with more chores before the club opened.

"I'm not Henri, Anglais," a voice said.

Bodie nearly dropped the box he was carrying as he whirled to see who the voice belonged to. Amused green eyes regarded him from the door.

"Jean-Marc." Bodie was pleased that he managed to keep his voice steady when he said the name, but it was a near thing. "What are you doing here?" It was well known in the club that the bartender didn't do any heavy lifting. There was a pool running about what blackmail material he had on the manager, since Gilles wasn't one to let his employees sit idle. Bodie had fifty francs on it being a compromising picture with the owner's wife.

Jean-Marc ignored the question and took two steps closer to Bodie.

"You are beautiful, Anglais. Did you know that?"

Bodie felt his face flush as he struggled to find a response.

"Henri said that, too. I don't see it, myself." He carefully put the box he was holding down on a shelf and took one step back.

"Henri is right." Jean-Marc took two more steps forward until he was standing in front of Bodie, then reached out and brushed a fingertip lightly across Bodie's eyebrow. "Beautiful." The word was said softly, as if Jean-Marc was speaking more to himself than to Bodie.

Bodie took a breath, gathered together his courage and said what his instinct was screaming at him. "You're beautiful, too."

"Thank you," Jean-Marc said. And then he smiled. Jean-Marc's smiles may have been rare, but they were as warm as any Bodie had ever seen.  
"I've seen you watching me, Anglais."

"I never…" Bodie started the denial automatically. Jean-Marc stopped him with a finger to his lips.

"I've seen you. Because I've been watching you, too."

Bodie stood there with his mouth slightly open, like a dazed child who'd had his nose pressed to the sweet shop window for weeks and had just been handed the keys. He cast about for an answer that wouldn't come.

"Meet me here tonight, after the club has closed." Jean-Marc gave another smile. "If you wish." Then he was gone, and Bodie hadn't even had time to say aye or nay.

The afternoon and evening passed in a haze for Bodie. Time seemed to move both too quickly and too slowly. He ached to throw the final customers out when time was called, and did his closing duties so quickly that he earned a suspicious look from Henri.

As he was wondering how he could manage to stay in the club when everyone had gone, Jean-Marc solved the problem for him.

"Anglais," he called from behind the bar. "Could you get some wine for me? We're running low and I want to stock up before tomorrow night."

"Sure," Bodie said. "What do you want?"

"I'll show you."

Jean-Marc led the way to the storeroom as the rest of the staff left. He felt Jean-Marc's hand on the small of his back, pushing him into the room, and turned to face him. And then there was absolutely no space between them as Jean-Marc moved in close, closer still, not stopping until they were pressed against each other and Bodie could feel the warmth of Jean-Marc's skin through his clothes, could feel the stirring of his breath, the beating of his heart.

"Do you want this, Anglais?" Jean-Marc whispered.

"Yes," Bodie breathed out the word and wrapped his arms around the other man. In seconds he was breathing hard and could feel the pulse beat in his throat. Jean-Marc ran his hand down Bodie's chest, slowly, stopping when he reached his belt. Bodie felt Jean-Marc's touch more keenly than he'd felt anything in his life. His chest burned, his cock twitched and his neck arched back, exposing his throat to the man before him.

"Do you want me, Anglais?" Jean-Marc asked as he slowly unbuckled Bodie's belt and ran a solitary finger down to the top of his cock.

"Yes," Bodie gasped out.

"How?" Jean-Marc's voice was cool, controlled and that inflamed Bodie further.

"Any way you like," he said, and he meant it.

"As you wish, Anglais," Jean-Marc said, and set out to show Bodie just how many ways they could enjoy the pleasure of each other's bodies. Jean-Marc fucked Bodie over a case of the club's finest champagne. Bodie returned the favour standing against an ancient wine rack. When the heat between them had cooled enough for speech, they moved to Jean-Marc's appartement and fanned the flames all over again.

They had six months together. It wasn't love, but it didn't matter. He liked Jean-Marc, a lot, and he loved the sex even more. It was spectacular, and more than made up for the fact that in the club they acted as if they were only passing acquaintances, co-workers who knew each other well enough to nod hello, but nothing more.

Then after six months, Jean-Marc was killed by a local politician: a big, black bastard who thought that Jean-Marc had slighted him and paid the imagined insult back with a knife. Henri had to hold Bodie back that night. Had to keep him from wrapping his hands around that bastard's throat as Jean-Marc lay lifeless on the floor. Had to tell him that there was nothing they could do, that the politician would walk, that justice would not be served and Bodie had better grow up and face that fact. Later, Bodie would wonder if Henri had known all along what was between him and Jean-Marc, but at the time he was too overcome with grief.

He quit the club the next day.

Two weeks later he was in the bush, on his way to learning how to kill as many black bastards as he could, his hatred of Jean-Marc's murderer overwhelming the memory of his lover's honey-brown skin.

oOo

The first time Doyle had sex with a man was in the bedroom of a friend's flat in Camden. The friend, Cassie short for Cassandra, was throwing a party in celebration of everyone passing their studio class. Doyle had just managed to get through his first term of art school by the skin of his teeth, and he was making merrier than the others.

By the time he'd noticed the other bloke noticing him, he was half off his head on cider and feeling so randy he reckoned his skin was crackling with electricity. Lips, hands, chest, cock, all tingled with the need to be touched. He looked up and saw a pair of dark eyes watching him from across the room and knew he had to have the bloke they belonged to. Tall, muscular with long dark hair, a slight air of danger about him, and looking a bit like Mick Jagger. He was a long chalk from the poofs who usually tried it on with Doyle. Exactly the sort of bloke Doyle could see himself fucking. Or being fucked by.

Doyle hadn't walked that side of the street for years, since his teens. Since Matthew McCutcheon, really. But he'd always wondered, always thought about it. Sworn to try it, sooner or later. And here he was, the answer to Doyle's dreams, staring at him with wide eyes and parted lips.

Jagger wasn't one of their crowd, not in his year at the college. Must be a friend of a friend, Doyle thought. No need to see him again, if I don't want to. No need not to, if I do.

So Doyle stared at Jagger and leaned against the mantle, canting his hips forward and to one side, then opened his mouth and licked his lower lip. Slowly. Jagger's eyes widened even more and he angled his head, asking a silent question. Doyle's nodded in answer, then glanced to the back of the flat where he knew there were two bedrooms. When Jagger followed his gaze and smiled, Doyle knew they were on.

Drunk as he was, Doyle made it to the first bedroom with nary a stumble. He fell back on the bed, a mangy old mattress lying on the floor with a blindingly multicoloured batik bedspread thrown over it, and waited. Not for long. The subject of his carnal thoughts joined him less than a minute later.

Neither of them said a word, they just got down to it. Clothes were shed and tossed on the floor and then Doyle found himself skin to skin with another man.

It was fantastic.

Rougher than with a woman, rougher than it had been with Matthew. Just what he was looking for and hadn't quite realized. They grappled and bit and fought and gasped. Finally his nameless partner took the lead and turned Doyle onto his stomach, grinding his cock into Doyle's arse as he reached around and grasped Doyle's hard on.

"This what you want?" Jagger whispered into Doyle's ear as he thrust once more.

"Just fuckin' do it," Doyle growled, arching his back and enjoying the feel of muscle flexing under skin.

Jagger didn't need anymore coaxing. Spit and precome easing the way, he pushed into Doyle with a single stroke. Doyle gasped, surprise exploding into pain firing into the purest sort of pleasure. He could feel the cock in his arse, could taste blood in his mouth from where he'd bit his own lip, could hear a voice moan and catch in exhilaration but couldn't tell whose it was.

Then, too soon, it was over, orgasm exploding behind Doyle's eyes as he felt the cock in his arse spasm and come. A last gasp and they both collapsed, tangled on the bed.

"Fuckin' 'ell," Doyle said, when he'd finally recovered both his breath and his wits.

"Like that, did you?" Jagger said.

"Like it? Did I. Fuck." Doyle threw one arm across the bed, letting his fingers dangle off the edge, feeling like his skin was shedding sparks. 'Like' didn't begin to cover it, he thought.

And if it was fucking fantastic, even with some bloke he didn't know, a treacherous part of his mind said, what'd it be like with someone he did know? Someone he liked. Someone he…nah, that wasn't bloody likely now, was it? Loving another bloke?

But the "what if" haunted him for years.

oOo

The first time Bodie touched Doyle they were in a back street of Hackney. The touch was not accidental, not casual, and carried out with with the natural born cunning that had kept Bodie alive in jungles both African and English.

They were walking back to their car, having made an unsuccessful bid to find an especially elusive witness. There was no one else there, no windows that faces might peer out of, no kids playing football in the street. Bodie wanted no observers and he picked his moment carefully.

He moved in close to Doyle, let one hand drift to Doyle's shoulder, the kind of touch you allow a mate, then to the small of his back. Finally, so lightly that it might not have been a touch at all, Bodie let his fingers trail over Doyle's arse.

A light touch, but it was felt all the same. Bodie saw Doyle's shoulders tense immediately, then he stopped and turned to face him.

Bodie tensed too, expecting a tongue-lashing at best, a punch in the face at worst. He watched as a number of emotions passed across Doyle's face: anger, confusion, amusement. Curiosity. Interest.

Bodie kept his own face as neutral as he could manage, only quirking an eyebrow in question. Doyle twisted his mouth at one corner in response in an expression Bodie had no idea how to read. Not until Doyle stuck a finger in his chest and said, "Thought you were a leg man."

Bodie laughed. Not much else he could have done; the bastard had him dead to rights. Could have done much worse than take the piss. Could have yelled at him to keep his bleedin' hands to his bleedin' self. Could have knocked him down, arse over teakettle. Christ, could even have taken out his Browning and shot him in the balls.

But he hadn't done any of that. He'd made a joke. Made Bodie smile. Even smiled himself. That, more than anything, let Bodie know everything was all right.

And Bodie couldn't wait to try it again.

oOo

The first time Doyle touched Bodie they were in the locker room at HQ. This touch was more than a matey slap on the back, more than a quick elbow to the ribs. It meant more, so much more that Doyle couldn't even say how much.

It'd been a bastard of a day. They'd spent hours chasing whispers of death and destruction, with nothing to show for it at the end of the day. Nothing but sore feet from walking and, in Bodie's case, bruised knuckles from duffing up one poor bastard who'd decided to try his chances against the pair of them rather than reveal the pitiful amount of information he possessed.

Bodie nearly stumbled onto the bench in the locker room, fatigue robbing him of his usual grace. He leaned back, eyes closed, hands clutching the bench behind him, and let out a great exhalation of breath. It was so unlike Bodie, a chink of vulnerability showing beneath his always cool exterior, that Doyle was drawn towards him. Before he could stop himself he was behind Bodie. Both his hands were drawn to Bodie's shoulders, and he gave them a squeeze that was almost, but not quite, a caress.

Bodie didn't jump, didn't flinch, didn't recoil. Instead, he relaxed under Doyle's fingers, muscles uncoiling, breathing slowing down to a more relaxed rhythm.

"You all right?" Doyle asked, giving Bodie's shoulders another squeeze.

"Yeah." Bodie cracked an eye open a slit. "Just knackered is all. Bit of kip'll set me right."

"Know what you mean." Doyle paused slightly before continuing. "Need a bit of kip myself. Nice comfortable bed would be just the ticket."

"Thought you said the bed in your new flat was crap." Bodie's tone was offhand, but studied for all that. And there it was. An opening. A way of trying his hand. And he found he really did want to try his hand.

"Complete and utter crap," Doyle said, keeping his voice oh-so-steady. Because he knew what he was playing at. What he was playing with. Knew just what he could lose if he fucked up. And what he could win if he didn't. Knew that it was long past time he could claim to be innocent of Bodie's inclinations and desires. Had been ever since that time in Hackney. He could have stopped it then, Bodie touching him. Stopped it cold. And he hadn't. Because he liked it. Enjoyed it. Counted on it. And maybe today was the day he was going to find out what that really meant.

Bodie was a smart lad. He knew what was on offer. Could read Doyle's mind here in this locker room like he did on the streets, on an op, under fire. His eyes were wide open now, face turned to Doyle, the tension back in his shoulders, expression coolly shuttered.

It was worse than waiting for the balloon to go up on a raid. Doyle felt his breathing speed up, his palms grow damp, his heartbeat stutter and race.

"I'll send you round a nice new pillow, shall I?" Bodie said. Not the offer Doyle had been hoping for, but not an outright refusal either. And Doyle could see a glimmer of light behind that shuttered expression, a gleam that told him that if he tried his hand again, he might get a different answer. A better answer.

"Don't bother." He cuffed the side of Bodie's head. "If I know you, you'll send that mouldering old thing on your sofa. Worse than the one I've got."

"Oh ye of little faith." Bodie crossed his eyes and stuck out his tongue and they were back to where they had been before.

But not really.

oOo

The first time Bodie came under fire he was fighting someone else's war in the Congo.

He'd had offers to join a few mercenary troops in Dakar. Word must have gone around that he was a good fighter, and there'd been a few hard-looking blokes through the club to check him out. But he hadn't been tempted until Jean-Marc had been killed. With the one person holding him to Dakar in the ground, he jumped at the first offer that came his way: a place in a mercenary troop on its way to the Congo.

The money was good, fantastic even, and he reckoned it would give him a chance to kill men like the one who'd killed Jean-Marc: black bastards gorged on their own corruption. And somewhere in his mind, he couldn't help thinking it would be a grand adventure.

It wasn't, though.

For two months it was sheer tedium. They didn't leave the camp and there was nothing to do but learn how to fight for real. He learned how to lay an ambush, how to supply covering fire for a comrade. He learned how to care for his weapons, the tools that would keep him alive; how to strip down and clean his rifle; how to check the springs in a magazine to prevent a stoppage. Even with the boredom, he found he had a talent for these new skills.

Then came his first battle, and it wasn't at all like the training. It wasn't neat; it wasn't controlled. There was shouting and screaming and the constant overwhelming chatter of small arms fire. There was noise and stink and the glare of explosions, and if Bodie had let it overwhelm him, he would have been frozen by bollocks-shrivelling fear. But he didn't, and he wasn't. He kept his cool and kept his position and followed orders. And when one of the enemy, a thin young man with a rifle that looked impossibly large in his small hands, crossed his path, Bodie did was he was trained to do: aimed, drew a breath, and fired a single shot.

His bullet found its target, and Bodie saw a burst of blood in the man's--no, the boy's, chest.

The boy didn't fall immediately. He stopped and shuddered and looked to where Bodie lay hidden in the bush. The expression in his eyes wasn't pain or anger. It was surprise. As if Bodie's bullet had betrayed his long-held faith that he would never be shot. And then he had slowly raised his rifle.

Bodie didn't wait; he aimed a second time and shot the boy again. This time the bullet tore into the boy's throat and he fell at last in a spray of blood and bone and flesh. It took a long time for the boy's body to strike the ground, and Bodie watched the fall with the cold knowledge of what his training had really taught him: how to kill.

It wasn't what he'd expected, what he'd craved. The boy he'd shot wasn't like the fat bastard who'd killed Jean-Marc and got away with it. He felt no sense of justice, of revenge, of a job well done.

But he found that he could live with it. That he could accept it. That all he had to do was stay cool.

He found he was a soldier.

oOo

The first time Doyle came under fire he was in a derelict house just north of King's Cross. He was on the Met's drug squad, had been qualified as an armed officer for over a year, but he'd never shot at anything more lively than a paper target or an empty beer bottle. Hadn't thought he'd ever have the chance, their DCI being the sort to drown you in red tape and paperwork if you even thought of carrying a weapon on a raid. But then they'd got word of a couple of nasty blokes moving in on the heroin trade around King's Cross. Blokes who'd used an old army pistol to threaten not only other dealers, but average punters and even a bobby or two. The DCI had pulled out all the stops. Called out the full squad, issued weapons and gave orders to take the bastards, whatever the cost.

Doyle was in the main hallway of the house, covering the first team to enter, when the villains opened fire from the first floor landing. The noise was incredible in that narrow space, and Doyle found himself resisting the urge to cover his ears as he scrambled for cover with the others. He and Ken Miller, a good lad he sometimes worked with, dodged into the lounge. Two others on the squad ran for the kitchen.

Doyle's heart sped up, his breath came faster, but not out of fear. No, it was more exhilaration. Like when he'd stabbed that boy in school. Only this time he was on the right side, and that made all the difference.

He ducked as a stray bullet knocked a piece of plaster loose beside him, then put his head together with Miller's. Then they moved, covering each other as they entered the hallway, went up the stairs and into a bedroom that was empty but for a stained old mattress and the two mad bastards who'd started the shooting.

They didn't have to shoot them in the end. The pathetic gits had run out of bullets and surrendered when Doyle and Miller burst into the room.

As they led the handcuffed villains out of the house, accepting praise and friendly digs from the rest of the squad, Doyle had the feeling he'd been allowed a brief glimpse into the world he'd been born for, a world of danger and justice and camaraderie. A world in which he could thrive.

A brief glimpse, but that was all. By tomorrow he'd be back to too much paperwork and too little real police work. Back to watching other officers take backhanders and turning down similar offers himself. Back to feeling like there was more he could do, more he should do, but nowhere he could even start.

Back to feeling alone. Because there was no one on the squad he clicked with. No one he completely trusted his back to. No one he even trusted as much as he'd trusted Sid Parker. No one who could be the kind of partner he wanted, needed.

The kind of partner he craved.

oOo

The first time Bodie saved Doyle's life, they were walking down Portobello Road. It was a crisp autumn morning, the sun barely up, the market stalls not yet open, and they weren't expecting trouble. Not expecting it, but it found them anyway, in the form of Nicky Bell.

Frightful little toad, Bell was. Ran with a bunch of anarchists whose goal was to overthrow the capitalist system or end post-colonial fascism or some such load of old bollocks. Bodie often wondered if any of them really believed in changing the system or if they just liked blowing things up.

Anyway, there he and Doyle were, walking down the street, Doyle sipping a cup of coffee he'd got at a little bakery that opened for the early trade and looking back as he told yet another of his atrocious jokes, himself slightly behind, munching on the last bite of a sausage roll he'd bought in lieu of the breakfast he hadn't had time for this morning, when Nicky Bell stepped onto the street in front of them.

Bell looked their way and froze. He knew them, all right. They'd had run-ins before, though they'd never found enough evidence to bang up the little bastard.

The next few seconds seemed to take a lifetime. Bell's expression went from gape-mouthed shock to flinty-eyed determination in an instant. He reached into his jacket, and it was a certainty that the stupid git wasn't reaching for a packet of fags. Doyle was just reaching the punchline of his joke, hadn't even noticed Bell, wouldn't notice him until it was too late. Bodie could see it all playing out, as sure in his calculations as Kate Ross with her bloody computers: Bell reaching his weapon, aiming, firing, Doyle dropping to the ground, striking the pavement with a sickening, final thud.

Bellowing, Bodie moved forward, pushing Doyle out of Bell's way as he drew his own gun. He aimed firmly at Bell, looking down the barrel of Bell's weapon. Bodie didn't hesitate, just pulled the trigger once, twice.

Bell didn't have a chance. His gun fell from his hand and then he was the one hitting the pavement, his jacket spattered in blood and gore, his eyes already glazing over in death.

"Stupid fucking bastard," Bodie said, standing up and looking down at Bell's body. "We weren't even looking for you."

"Speaking of stupid fucking bastards." Doyle picked himself up off the ground, and before Bodie could react, Doyle had shoved him against the nearest shop window. "What the fuck were you playing at?"

"Wasn't playing at anything. Was saving your life, you ungrateful…"

"My life didn't need saving." Doyle cut him off, his voice as hard as Bodie had ever heard it.

"He had you, Doyle. Had you cold. Couldn't let him take out my partner now, could I?"

"And what about my partner?" Doyle shoved him again, even harder this time. "What if you were wrong?" Another shove. "What if you'd missed?" And another. "What if you'd died, you unbelievable bastard?" And there it was. A crack splitting Doyle's voice down the middle like an axe splitting firewood.

Doyle stared at him, green eyes spitting fire, nostrils flaring, mouth set in a grim line. And it was funny, but this was the first time Bodie had seen it: how much Doyle cared for him. How much he cared for Doyle.

Didn't half scare him, that. 'Cause he'd spent years, decades, his whole fucking life avoiding entanglement, evading real connection. Caring wouldn't get you anything but grief. His gran had taught him that with her death. Jean-Marc and Africa and soldiering had added their own lessons, until he'd perfected the art of skating on the surface of all relationships, all emotion. Nothing and no one touched him. No one. Not really.

Not until Doyle.

Raymond Doyle seemed to have wormed his way into his mind and affections without Bodie realizing it.

He'd known he wanted Doyle. Known that from the start. Sexy git got him going, with his tight jeans and his suggestively lush mouth. But this went further than lust. So very much further. And he couldn't have that. Not at all. A little lust was one thing. But more than that… Bodie wouldn't, couldn't risk the hurt that was inevitable when Doyle left. Or died. No, he couldn't risk that sort of pain at all.

"I'm sure you'd survive it," Bodie said, his voice cold now that he knew the risks. And the cold seemed to work, seemed to douse the heat of Doyle's temper.

"Of course I'd survive it, you twat. Wouldn't be fun, though, would it?"

And then Doyle was calling in the shooting on his R/T and Bodie was watching him, already erecting defences against him, determined he should once again have no one close enough to hurt him when he could least afford the pain.

oOo

The first time Doyle saved Bodie's life, they were in a derelict Thames-side warehouse.

It was an undercover assignment, sussing out a bunch of villains who were smuggling people as well as explosives into Merry Olde England. And they'd done well. Had managed to infiltrate the bastards, map out their transport network, and finger the government officials who'd made it all possible. Murphy was their contact, and he'd told them that Cowley wasn't half pleased. The Cow had scheduled a raid on the gang's warehouse for the following week, just as soon as Bodie and Doyle winkled out the identity of one last member of the conspiracy and made their way back to HQ.

Didn't work out that way, though.

Because the last villain was an old mate of Bodie's from his days in Africa. One who knew he'd ended up in the SAS. One who knew he was working for CI5. Only Derek Clyde wasn't so much of an old mate, really. More an old enemy. And he'd taken an obscene amount of pleasure in pointing out to the rest of the gang that Bodie was the Filth, or as good as. Suggested they chop him up into little pieces and chuck the bits in the river.

Clyde didn't know Doyle from Adam, though, and they'd joined the gang separately so there was no connecting them if something like this happened. Which meant Doyle had to keep mum and watch as Bodie was bound to a chair, given a terrible beating, and pumped for information.

Never cracked, did Bodie. Never gave up Doyle or the op or what they'd learned or who they were reporting to. Must be all that good SAS training, Doyle thought, even as he kept his face hard and his emotions harder. As he kept an eye out for a weakness, a chink, a chance to get them both out alive.

That chance came when it was almost too late, when Doyle was beginning to think he should open fire on the lot of them and damn the consequences. But then Clyde must have decided that Bodie wasn't worth wasting any more time on and ordered two of their happy band to kill him and dump the body. Pete Driscoll, one of the other new blokes, was one of the men given that happy job. Doyle was the other.

Clyde's choice made a certain kind of sense. Get the two newest lads to do the dirty work, show their loyalty. But it was also the one piece of good luck Doyle had caught.

Not that Bodie seemed in any state to realize that. By the time he and Pete untied him and dragged him out of the warehouse, he was nearly unconscious. Doyle suppressed a wince as they dropped him on the dock outside the warehouse. Part of him noted how pleasant the night was, spring breezes beginning to warm up, the sky clear enough that the stars were visible even against the city lights. But most of his attention was on Pete, on judging when best to take him down and how best to do it quietly. 'Cause if he attracted the attention of Clyde and the rest of that lot inside, he might as well have tried to shoot his way out of the warehouse, one man against twenty, and been done with it.

Fortunately, Pete was new and inexperienced and he made the mistake of trusting Doyle. Doyle paid back that trust by taking him down with the butt of his pistol.

He tied up Pete, gagged him and then moved on to Bodie.

Even in the dim light of distant street lamps, Bodie looked a fright. His face was a mass of bruises and blood, and his hands were a right mess. Doyle could imagine what injuries his clothes hid. In a perfect world, Doyle would call in the Priority message on his R/T and wait with him until the ambulance and the Cow's cavalry arrived.

But it wasn't a perfect world. An assignment like this, you didn't bring your R/T or ID or anything that would mark you as CI5. And there were no phone boxes anywhere near, no friendly pubs whose phone he could borrow. So Doyle knew their only chance was to get to his car, two streets over. Too far to carry Bodie, and he didn't want to leave him while he fetched it, so he did what he had to: shook, slapped and cajoled Bodie until he was conscious enough to be mobile, and then practically dragged him to the Capri, all the while keeping an ear out for pursuit and hoping he hadn't made Bodie's injuries worse. Then it was just a matter of driving like blazes to the nearest hospital and calling HQ from a pay phone while the casualty team worked on Bodie's injuries and hospital security kept a wary eye on him.

He was saved from the difficulty of trying to explain to either security or the Met why he'd brought in a man who'd so clearly been beaten and tortured when Cowley arrived with Murphy and Jax and his welcome air of authority. Cowley had a quiet word with the doctor and suddenly the medical staff was looking at Doyle with respect instead of suspicion. And when they'd finally patched up Bodie, knocked him out with painkillers, and given him a room, Doyle was given special dispensation to stay with him after visiting hours while Jax guarded the door.

So there he was, four in the morning, unshaven, unwashed and sitting vigil over his partner's bedside. And wondering why he was there.

Time had been he'd thought they were close. Getting closer all the time. Ready to become very close indeed. And Doyle had welcomed the thought. More than welcomed it, truth be told. And he'd fancied it wasn't all on his side. After all, it was Bodie who had grabbed his arse at the least provocation, Bodie who had goosed him in Cowley's office, Bodie who hadn't been able to keep his hands off him.

Except Bodie wasn't like that any more. Hadn't been for a while. Was positively stand-offish, for Bodie.

Oh, they still worked as well together as ever. Still went to the pub, still watched a match at one of their flats or the other. But there was something missing. Something besides the lack of touch. Doyle found himself outside the barriers Bodie maintained to keep the world at bay when he'd been so used to being inside them. Made him feel exposed and uncomfortable. Made him feel cold.

It had been a long time since Doyle had felt warm. With nothing else to keep him occupied, he tried to work out when the change had come. A few months ago? More? A year? And then it hit him: Portobello Road and Nicky Bell. That bloody awful morning when Bodie had nearly stopped that stupid twat's bullet. Bodie had stopped touching him for a few weeks after that, and even when he'd started again, it seemed there was something missing, something he was holding back.

Doyle chewed over that change and thought about his own feelings on that day. How pissed off he'd been at Bodie. How gutted he'd been at the thought of Bodie stopping a bullet. As gutted as he'd felt when Clyde recognized Bodie tonight. As gutted as he'd felt watching Clyde's crew take Bodie to pieces and hearing Clyde give the order to kill his stupid bastard of a partner. And as gutted as he felt sitting in this hospital room, with Bodie oblivious in more ways than one.

Doyle leaned forward and put his hand on Bodie's, gave it a little squeeze.

"What am I going to do with you?" he said under his breath, not sure if he was talking to Bodie or himself or whatever deity seemed to be constantly fucking up his life.

He hadn't expected a response, but he got one. Because suddenly Bodie was shifting and moaning and opening his one eye that wasn't swollen shut. And there Doyle found himself, caught by Bodie's gaze, Bodie's hand in his, uncertain what the contrary bastard's reaction would be.

For several long moments Bodie seemed uncertain too. He stared at Doyle as if trying to work out a particularly difficult mortar trajectory, a small crease between his brows, his mouth compressed in a thin line.

And then he smiled. A big, open Bodie smile like Doyle hadn't seen in months. It made him look mischievous and beautiful and breathtaking in spite of the bruises that mottled his skin.

"Never knew you cared," he said, and squeezed Doyle's hand.

"Haven't been paying attention then, have you, you stupid prat," Doyle said and squeezed back.

Neither of them said anything more, and Bodie finally drifted back to sleep. Doyle, however, felt as if the sun had finally risen and thawed out the ice that had settled in his bones and veins. He felt warm, truly warm, for the first time in weeks, in months, in a year. All because Bodie, his Bodie, had smiled at him.

 _Stupid bastard_ , he thought, unsure which of them he meant.

oOo

The first time Bodie fell in love was in a small dusty African hospital, and he thought he was dying.

He'd been gut shot in an ambush and it had taken the company two days to get him to a hospital. Two days of pain and fear and misery. Two days of wishing his body would just give up and die.

He probably would have died, but their medic was a stubborn sod. Always worked hard to make sure they never lost a man. So Bodie was dumped at a mission hospital, fevered, weak, more unconscious than not, but alive.

The lone doctor--another ex-pat Brit, Bodie found out later--cut him open, removed the bullet fragments, patched up all the holes, sewed him up, and pumped him full of antibiotics. And prayed. Bodie lost more days to delirium and nightmare. He relived the raid where he'd been shot, pinned down by too many enemy forces, hemmed in by mortar fire and machine guns. Relived the moments when he and his mate Digger had come up with a mad plan to break the enemy line, remembered thinking it had worked and they were all getting out alive. And then there had been that awful moment when he'd been shot, when he'd felt a punch in the gut and looked down to see the blood. A moment before the pain had started, when he'd known he was as good as dead.

Then he'd screamed.

He supposed he must have screamed in the hospital, too, replaying the whole thing over and over, since when he finally woke up his throat was raw and dry and hurt like the devil.

He swallowed and opened his eyes and blinked and saw the most beautiful woman in the world sitting at his bedside in a crisp white uniform. She was young, painfully young, younger than he'd felt in a long time, and had long black hair, deep brown eyes and a mouth that curled into a wide open smile when she saw that his eyes were open.

"You're awake." Her voice was as beautiful as the rest of her, a light alto, tinged with a becoming bit of huskiness and a slight French accent. "We were beginning to wonder if you'd ever wake up."

"Who?" Bodie's own voice was an unbecoming rasp.

"The other nurses. We've been taking turns at your bedside." She smiled wider. "Not often we get a handsome young Englishman for a patient."

Bodie tried to talk again, but nothing came out but a quiet croak. Before he could think to ask, the young woman produced a cool glass of water with a straw. Bodie drank greedily.

"Not too fast," she said, pulling the straw away. "Too much at once isn't good for you." She smiled again, and parched though he was, Bodie couldn't find it in him to be angry with her.

"What's your name?" Bodie asked, once he could speak again.

"Nathalie." Her name sounded as lovely as she looked to him.

"Nathalie," he repeated, and fell asleep with a smile at the corner of his mouth.

It seemed every time he woke, Nathalie was at his side, looking after his needs, telling him stories about growing up in Marseille, studying nursing, following a sailor she'd loved to Africa and finding she loved the continent more than the man.

Of course, he fell in love with her.

She was a nice girl. European. White. The European women he usually came in contact with weren't generally very nice: prossies or worse, their eyes gone cold and dead, their only interest in him what he could give to them or what they could take from him. There was no one else like Nathalie, young and fresh-faced, seeing the world as a place full of adventure and wonder.

It had been so long since Bodie had seen the world that way--since childhood, maybe since infancy--that he was attracted to her like a shade-bound plant to the sun. He spent every minute possible with her while he recovered, and then after, he visited the mission as often as he could.

And in her way, Nathalie seemed to love him, her handsome young Englishman.

It ended badly of course, as all things did in Africa, with fear and hate, pain and blood. And death.

But for a few brief months Bodie found he could believe in love. And even after, with the mission destroyed, its patients and staff scattered to the plains and bush, and Nathalie buried in a shallow grave that had been the only dignity Bodie could offer her, even then he found himself hoping love might find him again.

Years passed and that hope grew small and stale from lack of use, but it was still there, waiting to be rediscovered.

oOo

The first time Doyle fell in love was in a small gallery in Soho. He'd finished his first year at art school, scraping by with a barely passing grade, and was working in the gallery until the autumn term.

The gallery owner--Robson Gunn, Robbie to practically everyone--was a nice bloke. He often hired students for the summer, using them for everything from manning the gallery to hanging canvasses for a new show. Doyle enjoyed the work, at least the working with his hands part. He liked hanging a new show, liked building frames in the back storage area even better. He hated the gallery work, though. Talking to rich bastards who didn't know a thing about art but were looking for a fast investment. Or a leg opener for some posh bird they were interested in. Doyle hated the lot of them. Never showed it, though. He didn't want to lose the job. Not quite yet. Not until the autumn at least.

Not that he was sure he wanted to go back to school. He wasn't nearly talented enough to make it in the art world, he knew that now. He wasn't sure he wanted to do the commercial work that he reckoned was all he could manage. And now that he'd done it, he was sure as fuck he didn't want to work in a gallery. Which left him precisely nowhere.

Then one day a young man walked into the gallery, flashed his warrant card at Robbie, and Doyle's life completely changed.

DC Dennis Compton couldn't have been much older than Doyle. He had a cheeky grin, ginger hair, steely blue eyes and a flash suit that Doyle couldn't help but admire. Couldn't help but admire the body in the suit either, though he was smart enough not to be obvious about it. Wouldn't do to have the wrath of the Met come down on you because you tried to pull a member of CID.

Compton had come to advise Robbie about an art theft ring at work in the area. He went through the gallery with Robbie and Doyle, showing them how to improve security in the space, giving them advice on alarms. And when he left, he shook Robbie's hand and gave Doyle a wink that set him wondering.

Doyle couldn't help thinking about DC Compton all that week. Thought about him at the gallery, thought about him at the pub when he was out with his mates. He especially thought about him at night, alone in his bed, when he wondered what it'd be like to kiss him, to stroke him, to fuck him.

And then, a week later, Compton showed up in the gallery again, wearing a different flash suit but the same cheeky grin.

"Thought I should tell you we caught the thieves," he said to Robbie, his eyes on Doyle all the while. "Nothing to worry about now."

Robbie offered him a cuppa, and he stayed, chatting with them about his work in CID and the other art theft cases he'd worked. Then he put down his tea and turned to Robbie.

"I've been thinking about your security since last week, and there are a few more soft spots in your storage room. Mind if I take Doyle back there? Show him how to fix things."

If Robbie saw anything odd about the request, he didn't say. Didn't even give Doyle a look, and well he might have after complaining about Doyle mooning around the gallery all week. Not a stupid man, Robson Gunn.

Doyle followed Compton to the back, his heart pounding, wondering if he was imagining everything.

He wasn't. As soon as the door closed behind them, Compton pushed Doyle against the crumbling brick wall and kissed him. Hard. Next thing Doyle knew, Compton's tongue was in his mouth, warm and slick and tasting of tea and cigarettes. Doyle felt his pulse pound, his breath speed up. He was just about to wrap an arm around Compton when the DC pulled away from him with a grin.

"Christ," Compton said, leaning against the opposite wall, his chest heaving. "You should come with a warning."

"You should, too." Doyle gasped, trying to catch his breath. "Been thinking about you all week."

"Likewise," Compton said, cheeky grin firmly in place. "Very distracting. I kept cocking up interrogations."

"I nearly hung a painting upside down. Robbie wasn't pleased, though I don't think anyone but the artist would have noticed."

"Some modern rubbish?"

"Less of the rubbish. It was by a friend of mine." Compton gave him a dubious look. "All right, it wasn't quite my usual taste, but still…" Doyle trailed off, unsure what to say to the man in front of him, the man who had so discombobulated him. Fortunately, Compton didn't seem to have the same problem.

"Have dinner with me." Compton said in a rush, giving Doyle no time to collect his thoughts. "There's a nice bistro near my flat."

"Yeah," Doyle said. "I'd like that."

"When do you finish here?"

"Six."

"I'll pick you up then." Compton leaned in for a final devastating kiss, and then he swaggered out of the storeroom, leaving Doyle standing there, wondering what it all meant. He wasn't innocent, had never been truly innocent. He'd fucked and been fucked by more than a few blokes since that night in Cassie's flat, but he'd never had one invite him to dinner. He'd never been with a bloke quite so flash, either, most of his conquests running to starving art students like himself. And he'd certainly never been propositioned by a member of the Met.

Running a hand through his hair, he calmed his breathing and went to join Robbie in the main gallery, looking forward to what the evening would bring.

Compton was funny, charming, ribald and sexy, and by the end of dinner, Doyle knew he'd fallen for him. Would do anything for him, anything with him. By the end of the night, they'd had each other several times over, and Doyle couldn't wait for them to do it all again and then some.

Besides the sex, the affection, the…Christ, he could say it, the love, Compton gave him one more thing: a new direction. Doyle had been flailing, looking for something besides art school, and in the Met he found it. Started grilling Compton about the police before they'd been seeing each other a week. Had applied to, and been accepted by, the Met by the end of the summer. Was attending Hendon come the fall.

Sometimes Doyle wondered who or what he'd fallen in love with more: Compton or the idea of the Met, but those first few heady months it had hardly mattered.

It didn't last, of course. Compton might have loved Doyle, but he was also ambitious, and ambitious coppers didn't have boyfriends. They especially didn't have boyfriends who were also on the force. Too bloody likely that someone would find out. So they fought and yelled and Compton let him down none too easy, leaving Doyle to wonder if he'd ever let someone get that close to him again.

But at least he had the Met, had the promise of helping people, of making a difference, and that had got him through it. That had been enough.

For a while, at least.

oOo

The last time Bodie fell in love was in a chalk pit in Surrey. Bloody stupid place for it to happen, when it came right down to it, but there's no arguing with fate.

The pit belonged to Charles Chandos-Gough, an industrialist favoured to be on that year's honours list. Chandos-Gough had interests that ranged from a chocolate factory in Essex to a foundry in Yorkshire, but it was the avionics lab in Surrey that had interested Cowley. He'd come to suspect Chandos-Gough was selling national secrets to the highest bidder. Bodie and Doyle had proved the Cow's suspicions were correct, had even tracked down the buyer--Pavel Aronofsky, a particularly vicious KGB agent Cowley had long had his eye on--and the specific secrets in question.

But somewhere along the way, they'd tipped their hand in the wrong direction and been lured to this pit with the promise of even more revelations of corruption. And now here they were, trapped behind a bloody great earth mover in a bloody great hole, while a trio of thugs hired by either Chandos-Gough or Aronofsky -- and really, did it matter which when both wanted them dead? -- tried to top them.

Another bullet whined past, barely missing Doyle's head.

"Watch it, sunshine," Bodie said, letting his hand stray to Doyle's shoulder. "Wouldn't want all that lead to put a parting in your curls."

"Watch yourself, Bodie." Doyle spat back his reply and impatiently shrugged off Bodie's hand. Bodie clenched his jaw and clamped down hard on the disappointment that flooded him. After all, it was bloody stupid to worry about your feelings being hurt when a bunch of villains were trying to blow your head off.

Still, he'd been his friend more than long enough to know Doyle's temper frayed most when he was worried, and the situation they were in was more than bloody worrying. "They'll get here, Ray," he said, instinctively seeking to calm Doyle's fears. "They must have heard our call."

"We could barely hear one word in five of Murphy's response, Bodie." Doyle checked once again on the last two clips in his jacket, and it was clear he was doing it just to avoid looking at Bodie. "What makes you think he heard us at all?"

"Just know he did, that's all."

"You're a nutter. You know that, yeah?" Doyle's comment was tinged with both bitterness and affection. So Bodie ignored the first and concentrated on the second. After all, if he'd been a sensitive flower, he'd never have survived this long as Doyle's partner, let alone his friend.

"No more than you," Bodie said with a cheeky grin that he knew would get up Doyle's nose. Aggravate Doyle and he might stop thinking about how deeply in the shit they were.

But instead of yelling at him, Doyle swung his head, then his whole body, away. Bodie turned, looking for what had caught Doyle's attention, but by then it was too late; the firefight had already started.

Doyle had fired three shots by the time Bodie realized two of the opposition had doubled back behind them. He took down one of the bastards before they could fire, but that still left one standing, a whippet thin, hard-looking man. Bodie struggled to get his own gun aimed before the wiry bastard could do any damage, but he knew he wasn't moving nearly fast enough. And then Doyle did something Bodie hadn't anticipated, but should have: he stepped right between Bodie and the thin geezer, raised his gun and fired.

The sound was deafening, louder than Bodie was expecting, but Doyle's aim was as good as ever and the bastard crumpled in front of them. Gotcha, Bodie thought.

Then Doyle flinched and staggered, and Bodie realized the sound had been so loud because it was two shots, and Doyle had taken a hit.

"Doyle, you stupid bastard, what have you done?" Bodie was angry and frightened and shocked all at once.

"Saved your life, in case you hadn't noticed." Doyle's voice wavered, even as he fought to stay on his feet.

"Stupid, fucking bastard." Bodie exploded as Doyle's strength failed him at last and he collapsed in a heap. "I'm going to kill you," he said, even as he straightened Doyle's legs and checked the wound in his side with all the gentleness he could manage.

"Think that fella might have done the job for you," Doyle said, and Bodie found he couldn't bear the gallows humour they so often relied on.

"Don't." Bodie stopped as his voice seized up, waiting till he felt he could speak again. "Don't you fucking joke about it." Bodie applied pressure to the wound and tried to ignore the sick look of pain his touch brought to Doyle's face.

"Christ, Bodie, it hurts." Doyle tried to pull Bodie's hand away from his side, but Bodie held firm. However much pain it was causing him, that pressure was keeping Doyle alive. There was no way Bodie was going to let go.

"Keep still, Ray."

Doyle shuddered and shifted and struggled to speak. "There's one left, Bodie. You want to keep an eye out for him."

"I know, Ray." Bodie spared one hand to place his gun within easy reach, even as he hoped their remaining enemy had seen his two companions fall and scarpered. "I'm watching for him. Now you just hang on."

"'S all right, Bodie." He couldn't believe it, Doyle trying to comfort him, when he was the one with a bullet in him. "I'll be all right."

"Of course you will, you stupid git. Now lie back and wait for the cavalry."

"I don't think they're coming."

"'Course, they're coming." Bodie struggled to hide the too obvious desperation in his voice. "When has Murph ever let us down?"

"Well, there was that last darts tourney." Doyle was clearly trying to keep it light, but his voice was getting quieter with each word.

"Murph did fine. It was you that was hung over, sunshine." Bodie followed Doyle's lead, joking even though he felt as if he'd taken a bullet as well.

"I never was."

"Well, _I_ was, and you'd drunk nearly as much as me."

Doyle took a breath to answer, and then stopped, his face collapsing in pain. And that did it, made Bodie abandon the pretence, abandon the banter. Made him realize all this man meant to him. Made him remember how warm he'd felt, waking up in hospital after Derek Clyde had done him over to find Doyle there, holding his hand. Made him remember the last time Doyle had been shot, when he'd found Doyle bleeding out his life on that fucking awful carpet and all he'd thought to do was yell at him about who shot him. Well, not this time. If this was all the time they had, he was going to say what mattered.

"Ray?"

"Be all right in a minute," Doyle whispered, his breaths shallow and laboured, his attention directed some place far away from the pain and the chalk pit and Bodie.

"Need to tell you something, Ray."

Something in Bodie's voice must have penetrated to where Doyle had taken refuge, because he looked up at Bodie with an awareness that was, if anything, far too sharp. "What's that, then?"

"You mean everything to me, Ray."

"Bodie-- " Doyle raised a hand as if to block out Bodie's words.

" _Everything_. Do you understand?" Bodie took in a lungful of air and held his breath while waiting for Doyle's response. Because his life suddenly depended on Doyle understanding how much he meant this.

"You're only saying that 'cause you think I'm going to snuff it," Doyle finally said, his voice thin and insubstantial.

"I said it 'cause I mean it. And you're not going to snuff it. I won't allow it." He'd have shaken Doyle if he could have, saying a bloody stupid thing like that.

"My hero," Doyle breathed out, and a cold spike of pure terror penetrated Bodie's spine as he saw the bubble of blood that formed on Doyle's lips.

"Doyle?" he said, nearly yelling, not caring if that last villain in the pit could hear him or not. "You stay with me."

"Can't breathe," Doyle gasped, and Bodie didn't doubt it. The bullet had hit a lung; Doyle must be near drowning in his own blood.

"You have to try, Ray. Hold on." Panic gripped him, even as he tried to stay calm for Doyle. "They'll be here soon," he said, though he no longer believed it, might never have believed it.

But then there was a sound in the distance that soon became the deafening roar of a helicopter hovering overhead. Bodie gave thanks that Murph had heard them after all, and hoped they'd arrived in time, as Doyle closed his eyes and slipped away from him and into a troubled oblivion.

oOo

The last time Ray Doyle fell in love, he was in a small, tidy safehouse in the small, tidy town of Evesham. The house was within sight of the River Avon and the town was half an hour from Stratford-upon-Avon, not that Doyle was up for either riverside rambles or taking in a play. Not yet.

Cowley had packed him off here a month ago, right after that debacle in the chalk pit. Or at least, once he'd got to the point where a machine wasn't breathing for him and the doctors had been willing to discharge him. In a perfect world, Cowley would have packed Bodie off with him, let his partner fetch and carry for him while he got his feet under him again. But, as he'd had so much cause to note over the years, this was not a perfect world. Jax and Anson had been sent with him instead, while the most he could get out of Cowley was that Bodie was "on assignment." Not long after they'd arrived, Jax had told tales out of school and confessed the assignment was taking out the remaining members of the Chandos-Gough organization. Amongst the other mischief they'd been causing, they'd had the bad judgment to make a further attempt on Doyle's life in the hospital.

Doyle had no memory of anyone trying to kill him--he'd been well and truly out of it at the time--but he could imagine Bodie's reaction. Took it very personally when someone tried to inflict GBH on his partner, did Bodie. Cowley would be lucky if the silly sod took any of them alive.

But while it was warming to know he had his own personal knight in shining armour, ready to slay dragons and assorted international criminals for him, Doyle would rather have had Bodie with him when he finally woke up in hospital, in pain, disorientated, and unsure that he hadn't died and been whisked off to some remote corner of purgatory or a lesser level of hell. He could definitely use his company now. He was about ready to murder Anson, though at least his bloody cigars had been banished outdoors in deference to Doyle's still recovering lungs, and Jax's well meaning concern was making his teeth itch.

What he most wanted was to finally talk with Bodie about what had happened in that chalk pit. Find out if Bodie had meant what he'd said. Figure out if what he thought he felt was real. If they had any future.

Those were the thoughts keeping him awake as he lay in the tiny back bedroom, shifting endlessly under the covers, trying to find a position that didn't pull his incision, cramp an arm or twist his spine out of alignment.

When he heard the noise the first time, a gentle rattling at the window, he took it for rain. But when it stopped and then came again, he recognized it for what it was: a hail of pebbles against the glass.

Macklin would have had his hide for what he did next, and Anson and Jax would have had heart failures if they'd realized what their charge was doing. But Doyle knew, knew with a deep conviction and absolutely certainty, that it wasn't a would-be assassin outside his window. So he stood, neither too quickly nor too gracefully, slowly walked to the window, his movements still restricted by his wounds, and threw open the curtains.

If he'd been wrong he would have been a perfect target. But he wasn't wrong, and there was Bodie in the back garden, poised to throw yet another handful of pebbles. The sight of his partner, standing there like an errant schoolboy caught by his girlfriend's dad, made Doyle happier than he'd been since he'd woken up in hospital. He threw open the window and poked his head out into the chilly night air.

"Oi," he said, softly enough not to wake Jax down the hall or alert Anson on watch in the lounge. "What are you playing at?"

Bodie grinned in the moonlight, and Doyle couldn't help grinning in return. "Thought you'd never wake up, mate."

"I was never asleep," Doyle insisted.

"At three in the morning? Pull the other one. It's got bells on."

"Couldn't sleep. And anyway, do you want to malign my character or come in?"

Bodie's only answer was another grin, and then before Doyle could protest, he clambered up the rose trellis and hauled himself up the drainpipe and into Doyle's room.

"Madman!" Doyle said, laughing. "Why couldn't you use the door like a normal human being?"

Bodie didn't make a joke in return. He simply moved in close and took Doyle in a hug that was both infinitely possessive and infinitely gentle.

"Glad to see you, Ray," Bodie whispered in his ear, filling in a silence that a stunned Doyle had no idea how to breach. "Last time I set eyes on you the doctors said you were out of the woods, but you couldn't have told that from your looks."

Doyle leaned into Bodie's shoulder, enjoying the sense of his partner's strength surrounding him. "I could have done with you there when I woke up." Doyle despised the need he heard in his own voice, but he knew without a doubt that the rules had changed now. That he needed to be more honest than he ever had with Bodie.

"Sorry." Bodie finally pulled back and looked directly at Doyle. "I only wanted to keep you safe. And I reckoned the best way of doing that was to nail the bastards that tried to kill you."

"And did you? Nail them?"

"Yeah." Bodie's smile this time had absolutely no humour, no warmth in it. It was a predator's smile, a jungle smile.

"They still alive to tell the tale?"

"Yeah. And Cowley's well pleased about that. There'll be enough evidence floating about to bring down more than a few great men."

"Good for the Cow."

"Bloody Cow. He wanted me to stick around for the interrogations, finish up the reports."

"But you didn't."

"Told him to get stuffed." Doyle gave him a dubious look. "Well, not in so many words. But I told him I was coming here, and if he didn't like it he could have my resignation."

"Bodie--" Doyle started, though he had no idea how to respond to that. Fortunately, he didn't have to. Bodie immediately started to talk.

"I must be an idiot, making you stand when you're still recovering. You pop back into bed. I'll close the window."

Doyle followed Bodie's directions, burrowing under the still warm covers as Bodie pulled the window shut and then shed his jacket and sat on the bed beside him.

"Doyle…" And this time it was Bodie who was clearly at a loss for words.

Doyle reached across and grabbed Bodie's hand, afraid Bodie might bolt before they'd both said what they needed to. Because he knew now, knew exactly what he felt and what Bodie meant to him and what he had to do.

He shifted back on the bed and threw open the covers. "You might as well join me. There's no central heating in this bloody house. You'll be cold as an iceberg before long."

Bodie gave him a look, but didn't protest. He kicked off his shoes and lay down carefully beside Doyle. Doyle covered them both, then put a hand gently on Bodie's chest. He lay there quietly, letting his hand rise and fall with each breath Bodie took, letting them both adjust to this new status quo between them.

When he was certain Bodie wasn't about to scarper, when he'd collected his own thoughts, he began to speak.

"What you said, in the chalk pit. You still mean it?"

Bodie didn't move a muscle, but Doyle felt his breathing speed up under his hand. "Yeah. That a problem?"

"Would I have hauled you into bed with me if it was a problem?"

"Never know with you, do I?"

"Well, you should know this, Bodie. Whatever you feel, I feel."

"And what do I feel?" Bodie's voice sounded lost, and he kept his eyes on the ceiling.

"I hope you love me, you daft bastard. 'Cause I know I fucking love you."

And that did it, broke the tension between them. And suddenly Bodie was laughing, muffled giggles that set Doyle off as well until they were both laughing like the mad bastards they were. At least until Doyle's incision protested the ill treatment and he stopped laughing with a wince.

"You all right?" Bodie asked immediately, resting his hand on Doyle's cheek in concern.

"I'm fine, Bodie." Doyle covered Bodie's hand with his own. "The scars don't like the laughing so much. Same as last time," he said, broaching the one topic they almost never talked about: Doyle's shooting by Mayli Kuolo. Not unless the pair of them were arseholed on bad scotch, and even then only with reluctance.

"I'm sorry."

"What for?"

"Sorry I wasn't there last time. Sorry you took the bullet for me this time. Sorry I didn't stop them before they nearly killed you in the hospital. Just…sorry."

"None of it was your fault, Bodie. Absolutely none of it. And none of it matters now."

"And why's that?"

"'Cause we're going to be together."

"For how long?" And Doyle was surprised to hear it: a tentativeness, an uncertainty in Bodie's voice. Bodie, who was usually the embodiment of the cocksure male.

"For bloody ever, if I have my way." Doyle rolled onto his side, mindful of his incision, and wrapped his arms around Bodie, holding him as tightly as he could manage.

"That's good," Bodie said, enveloping Doyle in his own arms.

Doyle smiled into Bodie's shoulder, wishing he felt up to something more athletic than a simple cuddle and plotting things they could get up to once he'd healed properly.

He was going to make sure that whatever they did, it was fucking fantastic for both of them. After all, it wasn't every day you got to have a first time with your last love.


End file.
